Lt.-Col. Godfrey Ewart Morgans, O.B.E., died very suddenly at his home in London on 4th June, 1948, at the age of 69.
He was educated at Bristol Grammar School from 1888 and finished his schooling in Germany and Switzerland. From 1895 to 1898 he served on apprenticeship at the Bristol Wagon and Carriage Works Co., and then spent a year at the Camborne School of Mines. For three months at the end of 1899 he was employed as a coal hewer in Somerset, and then joined his father, Mr. Thomas Morgans, of the firm Messrs. T. & W. Morgans, Consulting Engineers, on an inspection of collieries in India. In November, 1900, he returned to England and entered Peterhouse, Cambridge, in 1901, taking a B.A. degree in Mechanical Science in December, 1904. In January, 1905, he entered the firm of T. & W. Morgans, of which he was a partner until 1914. In this capacity he visited collieries in Borneo, the Philippines, Japan, Canada and the U.S.A.
In 1914 he joined the Royal Engineers Naval Division and after serving at Gallipoli was evacuated to Malta and was discharged as unfit for active service in 1916. He held the positions of representative of the Ministry of Munitions at Birtley Munitions Factory and superintendent of national shell factories at Leeds. On being passed fit for service again he left for Murmansk and Archangel in 1917. He was awarded the O.B.E. (Military Division).
From 1921 to 1923 he was engaged on contracting work in France for the Compagnie Générale de Constructions de Travaux Publics, of Paris, and then became director of engineering works and saw-mills at Hyères; he was also engaged in hydro-electric schemes in the Basses Alpes and harbour construction in French Morocco. He was subsequently technical representative in Italy for the Foundation Company of New York in connection with public works, and in the period 1927-31 paid visits to the U.S.A. on water power development. From 1931 onwards he was interested in the purification of water by ozone and acquired concessions for Otto Ozone Patents and Processes, and was engaged on this work at the time of his death.
Lt. Col. Morgans, who was a brother of Mr. H.M. Morgans, Past-President, was elected to Membership of the Institution in 1911.
Vol. 58, Trans IMM 1948-49, p.591
